Anxiety
by Sophia Hawkins
Summary: AU oneshot set in season 8. Something is wrong with Matt Casey, but who can help when nobody else is around to notice?


Anxiety

"Kelly!"

Severide was in the process of getting ready for the day when he heard Casey screaming. He ran from his room and charged into Casey's and stood in the doorway, still gripping the knob in his hand, and saw Casey sitting up in the bed, blood on his clothes, the sheets, and his arm that he was staring at in horror.

"What happened?" Kelly asked as he moved towards the bed.

"I don't know!" Casey was visibly shaken by this discovery.

"Let me look," Kelly tried to assess the situation and he noticed all the blood stains ranged from dark red to brown, "looks like most of them dried during the night...let me see." He grabbed Casey's hand and turned his arm for a better look. "You really did a number on it, you must've scratched it in your sleep."

"I don't remember, anything," Casey said, "I just woke up and..."

"It probably looks worse than it is, come on to the bathroom and let's get it cleaned up and get a better look," Kelly told him.

Casey got up from the bed and went with him into the bathroom. The blood was dried and clotted in parts, Kelly carefully washed it off for a better look at the actual wound, and he saw several deep gouge marks around reddened flesh irritated by the scratching.

"Looks bad but it should be easy enough to doctor up," Kelly said.

Casey had a dazed look on his face and Kelly knew he wasn't up to the task, minor though it was, so he cleaned out the scratches with peroxide and once they stopped foaming, he opened a jar of petroleum jelly and coated the scratches with it, then wrapped it up with gauze to keep it clean.

"Just a thought, you might need to clip your nails before you go to bed tonight," Severide commented.

Casey raised his other hand and looked at his bloody nails. They weren't _that_ long but it had been about a week since he'd last cut them.

"This...never happened before," he said slowly.

"Yeah well, don't count on salvaging the sheets, that stuff's never gonna come out," Kelly told him.

"I...I..." Casey blinked and tried to think straight, "I'll get another set tomorrow after shift change."

Kelly just opened his mouth to tell Casey that he was done, then his eyes widened as he saw the dark pink ring around Casey's neck. He reached over and turned on the lights over the medicine cabinet.

"What the hell did you do to your neck?"

Casey turned and looked in the mirror and he seemed to be just as shocked by the sight as Kelly was.

"Looks like some kind of rash," Kelly said as he examined the borderline crimson pattern that wrapped halfway around Matt's neck. He opened the cabinet, took out a bottle of calamine lotion and set to work dabbing around the rash with cotton balls until Casey's whole neck was a pale shade of pink.

"That better?"

Casey looked at himself in the mirror and merely nodded. "Yeah, thanks."

"Exactly what are you getting into now that I'm not around at 51?" Kelly wanted to know.

Casey tilted his head up and looked at the rash and shook his head, "I don't know."

Kelly said something and then left the room, Casey stayed where he was, and despite the mess he already had on his hands, he found himself reaching over and starting to absently scratch his other arm.

* * *

Another shift, another fire, another shower, that was the way it worked. Casey was in the process of washing the shampoo out of his hair when he felt something that had him opening his eyes against the water beating down on him. He stepped back out of the stream and lowered his hands and saw several hairs clenched in his hands. More than several, a couple months back he'd started shedding when the seasons changed, as always happened from the shift from summer to fall and then from winter to spring, just like a cat, but that had stopped weeks ago, and even when it happened, he never pulled these many hairs out at one time. He rinsed out the rest of the shampoo and ran his hands through his hair to wring out the excess water, and wound up with a few dozen more strands of hair on his hands.

Shutting off the water, Casey grabbed a towel and left the shower stall and looked at himself in the mirror. His hair looked the same, the ring around his neck looked irritated again, his arm was just a few pink scratches now, the irritated skin around them had finally returned to its normal color.

_You're a mess, Casey_, he told himself. He felt a prickly heat around his neck and he felt his hands reaching to scratch above his collarbone. Fighting the urge, he lowered his hands. He didn't know what was wrong with him, but he had an _idea_ what it was, and he didn't like it.

* * *

Casey woke up in the middle of the night and found himself scratching his arm again. He immediately stopped and turned on the bedside lamp to see if he was bleeding again. Not this time, the skin was just pink and irritated again. He looked at his nails that he _had_ clipped, _then_ filed to make sure there were no sharp edges, and he knew that that wasn't enough. If he hadn't woken up and stopped when he had, he _knew_ he would've scratched himself until he was bleeding again. He pushed the covers back and got up and headed to the bathroom. He was temporarily blinded by the bright lights but made his way to the medicine cabinet and dabbed calamine lotion on the skin to make it stop itching, then for added measure, wrapped it up in a bandage so he couldn't scratch through, hopefully.

For a brief moment he thought of waking up Kelly and talking to him, but he knew that wouldn't do any good. In any case, anymore when Kelly came home he was exhausted and went to bed not too long after dinner. After 20 years in CFD it was a big and sudden switch to be working 5 days a week, and having an exact schedule, unlike at 51 where you worked as the calls came in. Despite how much Casey desperately wanted to talk to Severide, he forced himself to go back to bed and leave Kelly alone.

But he didn't go back to sleep easily. He lay awake for a long time, thinking, and lightly scratching the bandage, and the more he thought, the harder he scratched. Eventually he stopped scratching his arm, and instead started scratching the skin around his ribs. It was a long night.

* * *

"Hey," Kelly said when Casey came home after the next shift, "what's with the haircut?"

Casey's hair was still coming out, at a faster rate than he was comfortable with, so far it hadn't been noticeable to anyone else but he was worried what would happen if it kept on as it was. He couldn't stop it from falling out but he'd gone to the barber and gotten it buzzed short like he'd had it years ago, if it was shorter, it wouldn't be as obvious that it was coming out, he hoped. The thing was, he'd gotten it cut two days ago, he and Severide hadn't been home at the same time long enough for Kelly to notice.

Casey hadn't really planned on having to explain himself, he just shook his head and commented, "Just decided it was time for a change."

"You couldn't have waited until summer to try that?" Kelly asked. "We're going into winter."

"I know...I just..." Casey sighed, trying to think of a believable lie, "just got tired of the same old thing."

"Ooh-kay," Severide responded in an 'I don't even want to know' tone.

"Why aren't you heading to work?" Casey asked, noticing that Kelly wasn't even _dressed_ for it yet.

"Because it's Saturday," Kelly answered.

"What?" Casey did a double take.

"It's Sat-ur-day," Kelly repeated slowly.

Casey closed his eyes and groaned softly. He didn't even know what day it was anymore.

"You alright? You're not looking so good," Kelly said.

"Yeah, fine," Casey weakly insisted, "it was a long shift."

"I remember," Kelly said fondly.

"I'm...just...gonna...catch a few Z's," Casey said as he gestured to his bedroom.

"Okay, buddy. See you later."

Casey marched into his bedroom and collapsed face down against the pillows.

_Idiot_, he told himself, _he's right here, talk to him_.

But he couldn't, and he knew he couldn't, and he knew _why_ he couldn't. He grabbed one of the pillows and shoved it against his face to muffle any sounds he was about to start making. He couldn't keep going like this, and he knew it, but he didn't know what to do about it.

* * *

Kelly opened the bedroom door and saw Casey lying face down on the bed asleep. He went over and nudged the captain's shoulder. He was met with a muffled grunt from the pillows.

"Sorry to wake you up, Casey, but dinner's ready. You've been asleep _all_ day."

Another series of grunts let him know Casey would be there soon. Not thinking anything of it, he went back to the kitchen and got the plates out and got everything set on the table. A few minutes later, Casey entered the kitchen and Kelly felt his eyes widen at how sickly pale Casey looked, which he definitely _hadn't_ looked like a few hours ago. He wasn't even sure what to say. It wouldn't do any good to ask if Casey was alright, he could _see_ the man wasn't, and he knew it wouldn't do any good to ask what happened because Casey wouldn't know, and if he did he wouldn't tell.

Casey sat at the table beside Kelly, and got his plate dished up, and then just looked at the food but he couldn't bring himself to touch it with his fork.

"Matt?" Kelly asked, scared as hell at what was going on, "What's the matter?"

A small sound broke loose. Then another. Then Casey dropped his fork on the table with a pronounced clatter, and his whole body started wracking as he brought his hands up to his face and broke down sobbing.

Kelly pushed his chair back and reached over and grabbed Casey and pulled him against him, completely at a loss for any explanation what was wrong.

"What is it, Casey? What's wrong?"

A few particularly loud sobs tore loose, followed by several loud gasping inhales as Casey tried to catch his breath to speak, the first few attempts failed loudly and miserably Finally Severide became aware of the sensation of Casey pushing against him, trying to get away from him. Reluctantly he let go and Casey shot to his feet and moved just out of Kelly's reach.

"I...I..." Casey heaved in large breaths between the words, forcing himself to actually say them, "I think I'm losing my mind."

Kelly looked at him, puzzled by this admission and troubled by the possibilities it may mean. "Matt-"

"I can't stop scratching...my hair's falling out...I can't keep anything down, I'm sick all the time...I can't sleep...and I can't talk to you about it because you're never here."

Kelly had no idea what to make of that. He stood up and faced Casey, "Matt, I'm here now."

"Yes, _now_...it's not like when you were at 51, you're only home _one_ day a week when I'm not on shift, I hardly see you in the morning before you leave for OFI, if I need to talk to you I have to be penciled in around everything you're doing...I'm all alone at 51 and I don't have anyone to talk to, Kelly!"

He hadn't meant for those words to actually come out, but there they were, and there was nothing he could do about it now.

Kelly was dumbstruck and it took him a few seconds to recover from his shock. "What're you talking about, Casey?"

"You don't get it, do you?" Casey asked, struggling to keep his voice strong, "It already feels like you've been gone for an eternity, and every shift it feels like you're never coming back. I'm not supposed to care who's working at 51, it's not supposed to matter who's there, who leaves, who gets rotated there, just as long as our teams are full and able to do their jobs, that's all that's supposed to matter. But it _does_ matter, it matters that my best friend who has been at that firehouse and I've worked alongside for over 15 years isn't there anymore. Gabby came back out of nowhere, completely messing with my head, and you weren't there when I needed to talk to you. I can't talk to anyone else about this stuff because they wouldn't get it, and there are things I can't tell anyone working under me, and I sure as hell can't go to Herrmann with them and he's the only other officer in-house."

Severide felt like he'd just been punched in the gut.

"Casey, I'm sorry, I didn't know that you felt that way."

"Why would you?" Matt replied, "There's _no_ time to talk to you anymore, at night you're either out with Stella or you're too tired and just go to bed." His voice was breaking now as he added, "And I'm all alone."

Kelly didn't know why he hadn't been able to get his feet to move before, but now he forced them to and he stepped over to Casey and put his arms around his best friend who right now looked very close to having a nervous breakdown. Casey collapsed against him crying again, and gradually the two men sunk down to the floor, still holding onto each other.

"I'm sorry, Matt, I didn't realize this was taking such a toll on you," Kelly told him. "I know, it's hard being away from 51, but it's not for much longer. I'll be back soon."

"No you won't," Casey tearfully replied as he weakly grabbed two handfuls of Kelly's shirt, "they're not going to let you come back."

"Hey, they don't control me," Kelly said defensively.

"Then why did you leave?" Casey wanted to know. "You said you wouldn't, then you left, _why_?"

Kelly chewed his bottom lip as he realized the corner he was in. "I'll tell you, but you can't tell anyone at 51, alright?"

"What?" Casey mournfully asked.

"First you need to calm down," Kelly told him as he let go of Casey and brought his hands up to Matt's face to brush away the tears freely flowing down his cheeks.

Casey sucked in several hiccuping sobbing breaths before he finally seemed to calm down enough that Kelly could talk to him.

"You remember that mess Herrmann got into with that cop when we assisted on that hostage situation?"

Casey nodded.

"I told Grissom I'd help OFI with their backlog _only_ if he made the complaint against Herrmann go away, that's all it is, Casey, that's why I'm there now," Kelly explained.

Casey looked at him with a slightly horrified expression and told him, "You shouldn't have done that, Kelly."

"What choice did I have?"

"You shouldn't have done it, we would've found another way to help Herrmann."

"And he gets put through the wringer, for something that wasn't even his fault, and everything he's worked for is just gone," Kelly shook his head, "No, this way nobody's at risk."

"But they're not going to let you come back to 51, Kelly," Casey told him, "now that they've got you they're going to keep you."

"No way," Kelly insisted, "I told them it was just temporary, just to help them clear their overload. All they wanted is somebody to rubber stamp their reports and go along with what their bosses say."

Casey shook his head, "No, Kelly, something is _wrong_. If that was all they wanted, they wouldn't have gone to so much trouble trying to get you. They want you for something else and they're not going to let you go now that they've got you."

"Casey I am not going to _let_ them keep me there," Kelly assured him, "Once their backlog's caught up, I'll be back, it's just going to take a little while longer. They're finding out I'm more trouble than I'm worth."

That worked a small laugh out around the gasping sobs escaping Casey's mouth. He wrapped his arms around Kelly's ribs and clung to him and said tearfully, "I miss you."

Kelly felt something in him melt when he heard those words. He'd known taking on this job at OFI would be an adjustment but he never imagined it'd be as hard on Casey as this. He put his arms around Casey and hugged him tight and told him, "I miss you too."

He couldn't wait to be done there and get back to 51, it was where his family was, it was his home, it was his life's blood. He didn't care what Seager or Grissom or anybody said, when he'd finished what he said he'd do, he was leaving OFI and coming back.

As if somehow reading his mind, Casey shook his head and told Kelly, "They won't let you come back, they've got something planned for you, they'll find a way to keep you there."

Kelly knew he was right. Seager and Grissom both fought too hard to bring him over to OFI _just_ for him to proofread some reports and go along with what everybody else was saying. But, since Casey knew it, and _he_ knew it, then he knew to be on the lookout for any surprises they tried to drop on him. He didn't care what they had planned, he _was_ going to come back to 51, to his family.

His thoughts were broken up by the sudden sensation of Casey hyperventilating against him. Kelly soothingly patted his back and coaxed him to breathe slowly and calm down.

"Hey, look at me," Kelly told him, "it's going to be okay, we're going to figure this out."

"I'm sorry," Casey got out around a set of heaving breaths.

"It's okay."

"No," Casey sucked in another breath and responded, "I'm sorry that dinner's ruined."

Kelly lightly chuckled and told him, "Don't worry about it."

* * *

"So when did you figure out what was causing everything?" Kelly asked Casey that night as they lay beside each other in Kelly's bed. He'd decided taking a direct approach to the problem would be more therapeutic for Casey's recovery and half carried, half dragged Matt into his room and gotten him settled under the covers so he could rest.

"I had my suspicions when I saw what I did to my arm and I just started scratching again, even then I thought it was like a nervous tic," Casey answered. "Then when I started pulling my hair out in the shower...it started to all come together."

Kelly shook his head, "I'm sorry, Casey, I had no idea how hard this was on you."

"Neither did I...every day just seemed to get worse," Matt told him. "It feels like you've been gone for years, not weeks."

"I know, and I hate it, but it's only temporary," Kelly assured him.

"They won't let you go, not easily," Casey said.

"Well that's fine, because I've never been an easy person, you ought to know that," Kelly said with a small smirk.

"This is going to make things even worse between you and Grissom," Casey pointed out.

"I don't care," Kelly replied as he folded his arms behind his head and looked up at the ceiling. "All he can talk about is Benny, how he thinks he's taking over for Benny now keeping an eye on me..."

"Steering you towards a better future than 51," Casey wryly added.

"While Benny was alive, I put up with a lot just to keep the peace...but now that he's gone...I don't care about it anymore," Kelly said.

"You don't mean that."

"Well...not much...and if he doesn't stop pushing me...I _will_ mean it," Kelly remarked. "If I never hear from him again, it'll be too soon."

"He won't leave it at that, Kelly," Casey pushed up on his elbow and looked at him, "You cross him, he'll come after everybody at 51 to get revenge."

Kelly conceded, "Maybe he would, but I can think better on my home turf, anything he could come up with, we could counter against, he _wouldn't_ win."

"He doesn't have to win, he just has to take all of us down with him," Casey said.

"If he was going to do that, he would've done it years ago," Kelly told him.

"But he's _still_ trying to get you to do what he wants you to do," Casey said, "He's not giving up, Kelly."

"Yeah, but he's forgetting that he doesn't know me as well as he thinks he does," Severide replied. "He's not keeping me at OFI."

"For all our sakes, I hope not," Casey replied, "Nothing's the same at 51 without you."

"I know," Kelly nodded, "Don't even get me started on OFI, _nothing_ there's even similar to 51, I hate it, I hate everything about it."

"Do you?" Casey asked hopefully.

"If it wasn't to save Herrmann, I wouldn't be doing it at all," Kelly told him, "I'll be back as soon as I can, count on it."

"You better be," Casey said, "It's murder not having you on shift."

There was a momentary silence between them before Kelly said to him, "So, tell me about what happened with Dawson."

Casey groaned, "It was a mess."

"Did you sleep with her?"

"No...not for lack of trying on her part."

"Why didn't you?" Kelly asked curiously.

"You weren't there, I had enough issues without _that_ one weighing on my mind and _nobody_ to talk to about it," Casey answered.

Kelly busted out laughing.

* * *

"You okay?" Kelly asked as he saw Casey stop in the middle of the room, almost absently running his fingers through his short hair.

Casey felt along his head from front to back and came up with only one strand of hair in his hand, "My hair stopped falling out."

Kelly heaved a huge sigh of relief.

"That's great, buddy."

"Yeah, for a while there I was starting to worry how that was going to look," Casey commented.

Severide laughed. "How about everything else?"

Casey rolled up his sleeves to show the scratches had healed, and the skin was no longer pink and inflamed.

"Good, good. What about the rest?"

"I can actually eat again if that's what you mean," Casey said.

"And I know you're sleeping now because you were snoring in my ear all night," Kelly added.

Casey chuckled and lightly slapped his side.

"I'm glad you're feeling better," Severide told him. "Like I said, this won't be forever."

"I know, it just feels like it," Casey replied.

Kelly glumly nodded, "I know, I'm sorry, but it won't be so bad now."

"I know," Casey responded, "I just wish I knew how much _longer_ it's going to be."

"Me too," Kelly said, "trust me, it's going to take longer than OFI wants because they drafted someone that actually knows how to do their job."

Casey laughed.

"But I don't think it'll take too much longer," Severide added.

"What if they won't let you go?" Casey asked.

"What're they going to do? I haven't signed anything, they can't hold me to anything, I did this as a favor."

"And a quid pro quo to help Herrmann. How long do you think they can drag that out?" Casey asked.

"What're they gonna do? I quit and they call CPD and tell them to reinstate the complaint against Herrmann _months_ later?"

"I wouldn't put it past them," Matt replied.

"Maybe not, but I doubt it," Kelly said. "We're _going_ to get this figured out, Matt, don't worry."

"I'm _trying_ not to, but it's not easy on this end," Casey told him.

Kelly nodded, "I know, and I'm sorry I got you in this predicament too...but whatever it is they've got planned, we're going to find a way to beat them."

Casey knew it was getting late, knew they both had to be heading to work for the day, knew they'd have to pick this discussion up later. Today though, he knew he'd be able to get through shift without feeling like the ceiling was about to cave in on him. He grabbed his bag and got ready to leave and told Kelly, "See you tomorrow."

"Count on it," Kelly replied as he also got ready to head out the door.


End file.
